Stephens Inc. AR Acquires 9,999 Shares of Royal Gold, Inc. $RGLD

Stephens Inc. AR lifted its holdings in shares of Royal Gold, Inc. (NASDAQ:RGLD) (TSE:RGL) by 49.7% during the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 30,100 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after buying an additional 9,999 shares during the quarter. Stephens Inc. AR’s holdings in Royal Gold were worth $5,353,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in RGLD. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Royal Gold by 68.8% during the 1st quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,682,911 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $274,887,000 after purchasing an additional 685,857 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC bought a new position in shares of Royal Gold during the 1st quarter valued at $40,882,000. Victory Capital Management Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Royal Gold by 117.0% during the 1st quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. now owns 415,179 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $67,886,000 after purchasing an additional 223,870 shares during the last quarter. Copeland Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Royal Gold by 106,046.2% during the 1st quarter. Copeland Capital Management LLC now owns 137,990 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $22,563,000 after purchasing an additional 137,860 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB grew its holdings in shares of Royal Gold by 51.6% during the 2nd quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 314,148 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $55,868,000 after purchasing an additional 106,993 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 83.65% of the company’s stock.

Royal Gold Trading Down 4.9%

NASDAQ:RGLD opened at $184.64 on Wednesday. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $187.86 and a 200-day moving average price of $177.71. Royal Gold, Inc. has a 12 month low of $130.67 and a 12 month high of $209.42. The stock has a market cap of $12.15 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.07, a P/E/G ratio of 1.09 and a beta of 0.41.

Royal Gold (NASDAQ:RGLD) (TSE:RGL) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, August 6th. The basic materials company reported $1.81 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.70 by $0.11. Royal Gold had a net margin of 56.24% and a return on equity of 13.30%. The firm had revenue of $209.64 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $186.63 million. During the same period last year, the company posted $1.25 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 20.4% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts forecast that Royal Gold, Inc. will post 6.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Royal Gold Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, October 17th. Stockholders of record on Friday, October 3rd were given a $0.45 dividend. This represents a $1.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.0%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 3rd. Royal Gold’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 26.39%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms recently commented on RGLD. Raymond James Financial set a $257.00 target price on shares of Royal Gold and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday. TD Securities reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $237.00 price target (up previously from $229.00) on shares of Royal Gold in a report on Friday, August 8th. BMO Capital Markets set a $240.00 price target on shares of Royal Gold and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday. CIBC raised their price target on shares of Royal Gold from $225.00 to $250.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, October 10th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Royal Gold in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seven have given a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $214.11.

About Royal Gold

Royal Gold, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, acquires and manages precious metal streams, royalties, and related interests. The company engages in acquiring stream and royalty interests or to finance projects that are in production, development, or in the exploration stage in exchange for stream or royalty interests, which primarily consists of gold, silver, copper, nickel, zinc, lead, and other metals.